Si Phan Don (Four Thousand Islands) to Phnom Penh

The next leg of the journey was the trip to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, which meant that I had to cross borders once again.

Leaving Si Phan Don :(

From Don Det where I was, there are travel agents all around the tourist stretch offering bus services to everywhere. I got my ticket to Phnom Penh from one of them, near the north end of the stretch, at 30USD and it seems like it's the only way around here so.. Pretty costly I feel, but at least it got me to where I want/needed to be.

After the boat fetches you back to mainland Laos, you'll be asked to wait for the bus to take you on your journey at the Ban Nakasang bus station, which is nothing more fanciful than a bus park. Once there, there will almost certainly be a person (not sure where he's from or who he's under) to offer you help with settling your visa to cross over to Cambodia, stating that it'll not be easy to get one at the border (false claims, I suppose, as I read that he charges more than what it will actually cost). For me though, the benefits of a Singapore passport is that I need not purchase a visa for these countries that I am going to, so that's good.

Spot the man offering to settle your visa for you!

It took just 30 minutes to get from Ban Nakasang to the border. On the Lao side of the border, you'll have to pay 1USD to just to leave the country. Once that's all cleared, you'll then have to walk 200m to the Cambodian side of the border, which charged me 2USD to enter their country. I don't know how much a visa cost, but for those that doesn't need to purchase a visa, 2USD is all you have to pay.

Walking to the Cambodian border

The crossing (from the Cambodian side of the border)

The Cambodian side of the border

Entering Cambodia

Food options at the border

The entire journey took me around 9h. Pretty dull ride though, except for the hens/chickens on the bus and the Hindi movie showing on the TV on the bus (there were subtitles though!). The bus will also stopover at 2 more stops for you to get food and drinks, so there's no need to stock up before.